Australian Research Council

This article is about the non-medical research funding body in Australia. For the medical research agency, see National Health and Medical Research Council.

The Australian Research Council (ARC) is the primary non-medical research funding agency of the Australian Government, distributing more than A$800 million in grants each year. The Council was established by the Australian Research Council Act 2001, and provides competitive research funding to academics and researchers at Australian universities. Most health and medical research in Australia is funded by the more specialised National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC), which operates under a separate budget.

Australian Research Council

Council overview
Formed	2001; 23 years ago (2001)
Jurisdiction	Australian Government
Headquarters	Canberra
Employees	135^[1]
Annual budget	A$815 million (2020–21)^[2]^: 147^,^[a]
Minister responsible	Jason Clare, Minister for Education^[3]
Council executive	Judith Zielke, CEO^[4]
Key document	Australian Research Council Act 2001
Website	arc.gov.au

ARC does not directly fund researchers, but however allocates funds to individual schemes with specialised scopes, such as Discover (fundamental and empirical research) and Linkage (domestic and international collaborative projects). Most of these schemes fall under the National Competitive Grants Program (NCGP), whereby institutions must compete amongst each other for funding. ARC also administers the Excellence in Research for Australia framework (ERA), which provides guidelines to evaluate the quality of research. ARC Centres of Excellence, funded for a limited period, are collaborations established among Australian and international universities and other institutions to support research in a variety of fields.

Since 2011, ARC has awarded the annual Kathleen Fitzpatrick Australian Laureate Fellowship and the Georgina Sweet Australian Laureate Fellowship, which are research fellowships for female Australian and international researchers, intended to support innovative research programs and mentor early career researchers.

History and governance

The Australian Research Council superseded the Australian Research Grants Committee, which had been providing funding to Australian universities since 1965.^[5] It was formed in 1988 as a response to the Dawkins white paper, 'Higher Education: A policy statement', and was established as an independent body in 2001 under the Australian Research Council Act 2001.^[5][6]

As of 2021^[update] the agency is administered by the Department of Education, Skills and Employment, headed by the Minister for Education and Youth.^[6]

The ARC's mission is to deliver policy and programs that advance Australian research and innovation globally and benefit the community.^[7] It supports research across all disciplines except clinical and other medical and dental research, for which the National Health and Medical Research Council (NHMRC) is primarily responsible.^{[citation needed]}

Research integrity

ARC updates its own Research Integrity Policy, which includes referral to the Australian Research Integrity Committee (ARIC) where necessary.^[8] The Australian Research Integrity Committee (ARIC) is an independent body, jointly established by the ARC and the NHMRC, to provide a system to review institutional responses to allegations of research misconduct.^[9][8]

Functional areas

National Competitive Grants Program

ARC funds research and researchers under the National Competitive Grants Program (NCGP). Funding opportunities administered by the ARC include the Australian Laureate Fellowship.^[10]

The NCGP comprises two main elements—Discovery and Linkage—under which the ARC funds a range of complementary schemes to support researchers at different stages of their careers, build Australia's research capability, expand and enhance research networks and collaborations, and develop centres of research excellence.^[10]

Excellence in Research for Australia

Main article: Excellence in Research for Australia

ARC administers Excellence in Research for Australia (ERA), Australia's national research evaluation framework, which is tasked with identifying and promoting excellence across the full spectrum of research activity in higher education institutions in Australia.^[11]

Linkage program

The ARC runs various funding schemes under the banner of Linkage Programs, which encourage research collaborations between researchers and a range of different types of organisations, including private enterprise, community organisations and other research agencies. The Linkage programs include ARC Centres of Excellence, Linkage Projects, and Special Research Initiatives (SRI), including SRI Centres.^[12] Recent funding rounds have occurred in 2011, 2014, 2017, 2020, and 2023.^[13]

Centres of excellence

Funded by the ARC for a limited period (often seven years), Centres of Excellence (CoE) are large-scale, multi-institutional collaborations established among Australian and international universities, research organisations, governments and businesses, to support research across a number of fields.

Continuing centres include:

• ARC Centre of Australian Biodiversity and Heritage (CABAH), 2017–^[13]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language (COEDL), 2014–^[14][15]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for the History of Emotions (CHE), 2011–^[13]
• ARC Centre of Excellence in Population Ageing Research (CEPAR), 2011–^[13]
• ARC Centre of Excellence in Future Low-Energy Electronics Technologies (FLEET), 2017–^[13]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society (ADMS), 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Children and Families over the Life Course, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Dark Matter Particle Physics, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Enabling Eco-Efficient Beneficiation of Minerals, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Innovations in Peptide and Protein Science, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Plant Success in Nature and Agriculture, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence in Synthetic Biology, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Transformative Meta-Optical Systems, 2020–^[16]
• ARC Special Research Initiative: Australian Centre for Excellence in Antarctic Research (ACEAS),^[17] 2020–
• ARC Special Research Initiative: Securing Antarctica's Environmental Future (SAEF), 2021–^[18]

Past ARC Centres of Excellence include:^[19]

• The Centre for Cross-Cultural Research (CCR) at the Australian National University, cited as an "ARC Special Research Centre focussing on scholarly and public understandings of cross-cultural relations and histories, particularly but not exclusively in Australia and in the immediate region",^[20] existed from 1997/8^[21] to around 2006/7.^[22][23] Anthropologist Nicholas Thomas was its inaugural director.^[24]
• ARC Centre for Complex Systems (ACCS), 2004–2009^[13]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for Creative Industries and Innovation (CCI), 2005–2013^[13]
• ARC Centre of Excellence for All-Sky Astrophysics (CAASTRO), 2011–2018^[13]

Gender equity

Since 2011, the Australian Research Council has awarded two research fellowships for female Australian and international researchers and research leaders to build Australia's research capacity, undertake innovative research programs and mentor early career researchers. The Kathleen Fitzpatrick Australian Laureate Fellowship is awarded to a candidate from the humanities, arts and social science disciplines and the Georgina Sweet Australian Laureate Fellowship is awarded to a candidate from the science and technology disciplines.^[25]

Year	Kathleen Fitzpatrick Fellow	Georgina Sweet Fellow
2011	Pippa Norris^[26]	Mahananda Dasgupta^[27]
2012	Susan O'Connor^[28]	Nalini Joshi^[29]
2013	Glenda Sluga^[30]	Tanya Monro^[31]
2014	Joy Damousi^[32]	Veena Sahajwalla,^[33] Kate Smith-Miles^[34]
2015	Anne Orford^[35]	Leann Tilley^[35]
2016	Adrienne Stone,^[36] Sharon Parker^[37]	Branka Vucetic^[38]
2017	Ann McGrath^[39]	Michelle Coote^[39]
2018	Marilyn Fleer^[40]	Christine Beveridge^[41]
2019	Lynette Russell^[42]	Belinda Medlyn^[43]
2020	Maureen Dollard^[44]	Catherine Lovelock^[45]
2021	Sundhya Pahuja^[46]	Yun Liu^[47]
2022	Larissa Behrendt^[48]	Joanne Etheridge^[49]

Notes

1. This value represents the funding allocated to the ARC for the purposes of research grants, and does not include the operational budget of the agency.

References

1. APS Employment Data 31 December 2019 release (Report). Australian Public Service Commission. 31 December 2019.
2. "Portfolio Budget Statements 2020-21". Department of Education, Skills and Employment. 11 May 2021. from the original on 17 August 2021. Retrieved 3 September 2021.
3. "About the Australian Research Council". Australian Research Council. 25 May 2021. from the original on 13 September 2018. Retrieved 3 September 2021.
4. "CEO". Australian Research Council. 11 April 2022. Retrieved 13 April 2022.
5. Benner, Mats; Grant, Jonathan; O’Kane, Mary (2022), Benner, Mats; Grant, Jonathan; O’Kane, Mary (eds.), "Higher Education in Australia", Crisis Response in Higher Education: How the Pandemic Challenged University Operations and Organisation, Cham: Springer International Publishing, pp. 51–63, doi:10.1007/978-3-030-97837-2_4, ISBN 978-3-030-97837-2, from the original on 25 November 2023
6. "Australian Research Council Act 2001". Act No. 8 of 27 February 2020. Parliament of Australia. Retrieved 16 March 2021.
7. "Australian Research Council Annual Report 2014-15". Australian Research Council. Retrieved 3 May 2020.
8. "ARC Research Integrity Policy, Version 2021.1". Policy and Strategy Branch, ARC. 1 July 2021.
9. "Australian Research Integrity Committee (ARIC)". Retrieved 3 May 2020.
10. . Australian Research Council. Archived from the original on 11 April 2020. Retrieved 3 May 2020.
11. "Excellence in Research for Australia". Retrieved 3 May 2020.
12. "Linkage Program". Australian Research Council.
13. "ARC Centres of Excellence". Australian Research Council. 2023. Retrieved 28 December 2023.
14. ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language
15. ARC. "2014 ARC Centre of Excellence for the Dynamics of Language". Australian Research Council. from the original on 9 April 2020. Retrieved 24 August 2021.
16. Australian Research Council (14 August 2019). "Selection Report: ARC Centres of Excellence 2020". www.arc.gov.au. from the original on 23 March 2020. Retrieved 8 August 2021.
17. "About". ACEAS. 3 March 2022. Retrieved 7 February 2024.
18. "About SAEF". SAEF. 7 November 2023. Retrieved 7 February 2024.
19. Note: See also template below.
20. "Australian". Cultural Studies Association of Australasia. Retrieved 15 September 2020.
21. "Annual report (Journal, magazine)". WorldCat.org. Retrieved 15 September 2020.
22. "Trove [search]". Trove. Retrieved 15 September 2020.
23. "Australian National University Centre for Cross-Cultural Research". WorldCat.org. Retrieved 15 September 2020.
24. "Fellows". Australian Academy of the Humanities. 28 January 2020. Retrieved 14 September 2020.
25. "Kathleen Fitzpatrick and Georgina Sweet Australian Laureate Fellows". Australian Research Council. Retrieved 2 August 2019.
26. . University of Sydney. 10 August 2011. Archived from the original on 4 March 2016. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
27. "ANU Annual Report 2011" (PDF). Australian National University. April 2012. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
28. . Australian National University. 30 July 2012. Archived from the original on 13 November 2020. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
29. Gill, Katynna (30 July 2012). . University of Sydney. Archived from the original on 19 April 2016. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
30. . University of Sydney. 10 July 2013. Archived from the original on 21 June 2017. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
31. "TWO LAUREATE FELLOWSHIPS FOR UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE". University of Adelaide. 9 July 2013. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
32. . University of Melbourne. 22 August 2014. Archived from the original on 2 July 2016. Retrieved 1 November 2020.
33. "Modern-day alchemists win Australian Laureate Fellowships". University of New South Wales. 22 August 2014. Retrieved 21 January 2018.
34. "Monash receives two Australian Laureate Fellowships". Monash University. 22 August 2014. Retrieved 21 January 2018.
35. . University of Melbourne. 24 June 2015. Archived from the original on 2 January 2019. Retrieved 3 May 2020.
36. "University congratulates new Laureate fellows and Linkage Project awardees". University of Melbourne. 6 May 2016. Retrieved 21 January 2018.
37. "Ground-breaking work design researcher wins ARC Laureate Fellowship". University of Western Australia. 6 May 2016. Retrieved 21 January 2018.
38. Hollick, Victoria (6 May 2016). "ARC Laureate Fellowship for wireless communications specialist". University of Sydney. Retrieved 21 January 2018.
39. "ANU wins three Australian Laureate Fellowships". Australian National University. 5 June 2017. Retrieved 20 January 2018.
40. "Australian laureate fellowships for two Monash researchers". Monash University. 2 August 2018. Retrieved 3 May 2020.
41. "UQ soars with a record-breaking six laureates". University of Queensland. 2 August 2018. Retrieved 3 May 2020.
42. "Monash academics awarded Australian Research Council Laureate Fellowships". Monash University. 12 September 2019. Retrieved 2 May 2020.
43. "Western Sydney University academic wins prestigious Georgina Sweet Australian Laureate Fellowship". Western Sydney University. 10 October 2019. Retrieved 2 May 2020.
44. "2020 Laureate Profile: Professor Marueen Dollard". Retrieved 9 July 2020.
45. "2020 Laureate Profile: Professor Catherine Lovelock". Retrieved 9 July 2020.
46. "2021 Laureate Profile: Professor Sundhya Pahuja". Australian Research Council. 23 June 2021. from the original on 7 July 2021. Retrieved 4 November 2021.
47. "2021 Laureate Profile: Professor Yun Liu". Australian Research Council. 23 June 2021. from the original on 7 July 2021. Retrieved 4 November 2021.
48. "2022 Laureate Profile: Professor Larissa Behrendt". Australian Research Council. Retrieved 13 September 2022.
49. "2022 Laureate Profile: Professor Joanne Etheridge". Australian Research Council. Retrieved 13 September 2022.

External links

• Official website